Here the truth, the spiritual food which the Lord is supplying, is the whole attraction: human flourish and oratory find little room foi exercise here; they are lacking but are not missed. The gathered and gathering ones come together because they hunger and thirst after righteousness:" and they are finding the satisfying portion which the Lord himself has provided; and each for himself is eating thereof.

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WATCH, IF YE WOULD KNOW.

"Watch therefore: for ye know not what hour your Lord doth come. But understand this [the reason why the time is so secreted under symbols and parables], that if the householder had known in what watch the thief would come, he would have watched, and would not have suffered his house to be broken up."-Matt. 24:42, 43.

The master of the house" or "householder" of the present dispensation is not our Lord, but our Adversary, the devil-"the god of this world," the prince of the power of the air, "the prince of this world," who now ruleth in the children of disobedience, blinding the minds of all that believe not-whose eyes of understanding have not been anointed with the Lord's eye-salve. (2 Cor. 4:4; Eph. 22: Rev. 3:18.) This adversary is a wily one, and very cunning; and whatever knowledge he has of the divine times and seasons and arrangements he is prompt to use in opposing the divine plan, as our Lord declares in the foregoing statement.

The Heavenly Father's course toward Satan has been to let him take his own way, except where it would conflict with the divine plan, and so to overrule his evil devices as to use them for the furtherance of the divine plan. Hence Satan, although he has long known the Bible, has understood but little of it, for the same reason that man has not understood it; because written in parables, symbols and figures of speech. And now that these are due to be understood, the understanding of them is confined to such as have the guidance of the holy spirit, which, as our Lord promised, "shall guide you into all truth," but which the world cannot receive. Satan does not possess the holy

spirit and is not guided by it, and consequently much of the divine Word is foolishness unto him. But he has learned no doubt as the world to some extent has learned, that "The Secret of the Lord is with them that fear him.' (Psa. 25:14.) We may presume therefore that his representatives, the fallen angels, are frequently present at the little Conferences and Bible studies, etc., of God's truly consecrated people, to learn something of the divine plan.

In what way Satan would have managed his affairs differently if he had known sooner more about the divine plan, we can only surmise; but we have our Lord's positive testimony that such knowledge on Satan's part would have made necessary a different ending of the Gospel age, and a different opening of the Millennial age, than God had purposed and declared. But instead of knowing and setting his house in order, he was taken unawares by the Lord's parousia in 1874, and the "harvest" work then begun: so that with all his wiles and deceptions, all his simulations of the true light, etc., his "house," present institutions, will suffer complete collapse. As he realizes this, he puts forth the most strenuous efforts to deceive;—even resorting through his deluded servants to miracles of physical healing, although he is the prince of disease, sickness and death. (Heb. 2:14.) But a house thus divided against itself is sure to fall: and great will be the fall of Babylon: it will fall as a great millstone cast into the sea.-Rev. 18:21. "Therefore be ye also ready, for at such an hour as ye think not the Son of Man cometh."-Matt. 24:44.

Here "ye also," believers, the Lord's faithful, are mentioned in contrast with Satan and his household. The time of the Lord's presence could not be known beforehand, even by the saints. Nor was the fact of the Lord's presence recognized until nearly a year after October 1874, when his knock, through the word of the prophets and apostles, was recognized. Since that time there are abundant outward signs, evidences, of the presence of the Son of Man; and his devoted ones as they are gathered from the four winds of heaven, are taken into his banqueting house and caused to sit down to meat such as the world knoweth not of, and are served, first of all by the Master himself, and incidentally by each other.-See Luke 12:37.

DISPENSING OF FOOD TO THE HOUSEHOLD.

-MATT. 24:45-51; LUKE 12:42-46.—

"Who then is the faithful and prudent servant, whom his Master has placed over his household to give them food in due season. Happy that servant whom his Master, on coming, shall find thus employed! Indeed I say to you that he will appoint him over all his stores of provisions." --Matt. 24:45-51; Luke 12:42-46.

The intimation here seems to be, that at the particular time indicated by the prophecy,-namely, during the Lord's presence, and at the time of the gathering of the elect—our Lord, the great Servant of his people, will make choice of one channel for dispensing the meat in due season, though other channels or "fellow-servants" will be used in bringing the food to the "household." But the servant is merely a steward, and liable to be removed at any moment, should he fail to fully and duly acknowledge in every particular, the Master, the great Servant of God, and his people,the Messenger of the Covenant,"-Christ.

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Faithfulness on the part of said steward (both to the "Master" and to "his fellow-servants" and "the household") will be rewarded by his continuance as steward ;so long as he serves faithfully, he may continue, and may serve the household of faith with things new and old,meat in due season-to the end; bringing forth all the precious things of divine provision. But if unfaithful he will be deposed entirely and put into outer darkness, while presumably another would take the place, subject to the same conditions.

To our understanding this would not imply that "that servant" or steward, used as a channel for the circulation of the "meat in due season, "would be the originator of that meat, nor inspired, nor infallible. Quite to the contrary, we may be sure that whoever the Lord will so use, as a truth-distributing agent, will be very humble and unassuming, as well as very zealous for the Master's glory; so that he would not think of claiming authorship or ownership of the truth, but would merely dispense it zealously, as his Master's gift, to his Master's 'servants" and "household."

Any other spirit and course would surely work a change of steward. This is detailed by our Lord as follows:

"But if that servant shall [become] wicked, and [losing faith] say in his heart, My Master delays his coming; and shall smite his fellow-servants, and eat and drink with the intemperate [of their false doctrines], the Master of that servant will be present in a day that he looketh not for, and in an hour that he is not aware of, and shall cut him off [from being his servant] and will appoint him his portion with the hypocrites: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth."-Matt. 24:48-51.

*

Our Lord was the greatest of all Prophets, and his prophecy likewise the most striking. Moses' and Jeremiah's and other prophecies deal chiefly with the rejection and regathering of fleshly Israel. Isaiah's prophecies besides dealing with fleshly Israel show Jesus Christ the sufferer for our sins as also a light to the Gentiles, and ultimately the opening of all the blind eyes of humanity to "that true light.' Daniel foretells the coming and cutting off of Messiah, the Pentecostal anointing of the most holy, the history of Gentile powers to their end, and the establishment of Messiah's Kingdom under the whole heaven. He also shows the persecuting power of the Papal little horn, its wearing out of the saints during the age, and the days of waiting for the Kingdom, etc. But no other prophet than our Lord has given us the needed details of this "harvest" time, connecting these with the prominent events noted by the other prophets.

Our Lord's prophecy, like those of the others, is veiled in symbolic and parabolic language, and for the same purpose; that none of the wicked should understand," but the meek, honest and faithful of God's people only,in God's due time and way.

"Unto you it is given to understand the mysteries of the Kingdom of God: but to others in parables ["dark sayings"]; that seeing they might not see, and hearing they might not understand."-Luke 8:10.

CHAPTER XIII.

THE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE KINGDOM, AND HOW IT WILL MANIFEST ITSELF.

WALKING BY FAITH.-WHO Constitute the Kingdom.-Setting Up the SpirITUAL KINGDOM.-SETTING UP " PRINCES IN ALL THE EARTH."-THE DESIRE OF ALL NATIONS. THE INTIMATE COMMUNICATION BETWEEN THE Kingdom AND ITS MINISters or “Princes.”—Jacob's LADDER.-Moses' Vail.-Great CHANGES INAUGURATED.-WILL THERE BE DANGER FROM SO MUCH POWER IN THE HANDS OF THE NEW POTENTATE?—THE Rod-of-Iron RULE, HOW LONG? -THE WORLD'S Conversion.-A NATION BORN IN A DAY.-"ALL THAT are IN THE GRAVES."-THE INCREASE OF HIS KINGDOM.-THE VICEGERENCY SURRENDERED.-GOD'S WILL DONE ON EARTH.

"And the desire of all nations shall come." "In the last days it shall come to pass that the mountain of the house of the Lord shall be established in the top of the mountains."

"At that time they shall call Jerusalem The Throne of the Lord; and all the nations shall be gathered unto it, to the name of the Lord, to Jerusalem: neither shall they walk any more after the stubbornness of their evil heart."-Hag. 2:7; Micah 4: 1, 2; Jer. 3:17.

HA

AVING in our studies of the divine plan reached the close of the trouble of the great "Day of Vengeance" and seen how the divine indignation will burn against sin and selfishness, we have now the more agreeable task of examining, in the light of the Bible, how the Kingdom of God is to be established, by which all the families of the earth are to blessed, and a new and permanent and far better order of things set up, instead of the admittedly faulty one of the present and past.